It's no secret to me- I thrive much better with my back to the wall. Forced into situations where I have to execute with no safety net, I tend to think that my record speaks pretty well for me.
White knuckled optimism is always nice but nothing beats work, yeah?
Without the uhh... motivation of complete failure or death, I can slide into slovenly laziness pretty rapidly. I know this. My attention span turns crappy pretty quickly and I lose interest... I know, I know.
The rub, however, is that anything that requires a safety net usually requires lots of practice. Which, even though I suck at it, I still try to maintain. Furthermore, even though there's a net, it doesn't mean I don't hurt myself getting there.
And maybe this makes sense or it doesn't, but this is how I'm looking at the last year of my life:
It's time to remove the nets, man.
I operate on the assumption that there is never a net. It's all an illusion of safety...when the safety is actually pretty tentative at best. But what do I know?
ReplyDeleteactually, mr. mcdust, you're hitting on a pretty valid point there. yes. there is always an illusion of safety. and that's kind of the whole point of removing the nets. because it's never actually about the net so much as how the net effects your mind.
ReplyDeletewe play it safe so often because we think there's something to be gained by it. usually, if you have to rely on the net, all you have to gain is disfigurement and paralysis without the benefit of death. but what do i know?